Read in August

It's coming to be a pattern: after a month with a huge number of books (like July), there's a month with a more modest total (like August). I'm reading so much comic-book-y stuff that even the "small" number might look big, but, really, there's an awful lot of pictures embedded in that number. So this month was 33, after last month's 47. And I don't think it was because my "real" books were longer one, either; I think August was a big pile of comics and a lot of slacking off -- which sounds about right for the end of summer.

What I did read this past month was:

• Kyo Shirodaira & Eita Mizuno, Spiral: The Bonds of Reasoning, Vol. 4 (8/1)
  
• Paul Collins, The Trouble With Tom (8/1)
  
• Masashi Kishimoto, Naruto, Vol. 20 (8/3)
  I believe this volume set up the storyline of the next seven or eight volumes, with Naruto's friend/rival/teammate Sasuke agreeing to run off to see the big bad villain, Orochimaru, and have his power increased vastly (by turning to evil -- that always does it). Naruto and four others set off after Sasuke (currently dead, though not for tax reasons) and the four evil ninjas who are transporting him. I think.
  
• Julia Wertz, The Fart Party (8/4)
  
• Peter S. Beagle, I See By My Outfit (8/5)
  
• "Samuel Holt" (pseudonym for Donald E. Westlake), What I Tell You Three Times Is False (8/7)
  
• Timothy Truman, Scout, Vol. 2 (8/9)
  
• Katsu Aki, Manga Sutra, Vol. 1 (8/10)
  
• Yutta Narukami, Pretty Poison (8/12)
  
• J.R. "Yellow Kid" Weil & W.T. Brannon, Con Man: A Master Swindler's Own Story (8/13)
  
• Shikuo Kano, Yakuza in Love, Vol. 1 (8/13)
  
• Masashi Kishimoto, Naruto, Vol. 21 (8/14)
  More chasing and fighting; the pattern of this series is set: one of Naruto's young allies squares off against one of the evil Sound Ninja Four, while the rest of the cast continues chasing each other. Then the good guy and the bad guy battle until they both appear to be dying, and the curtain falls.
  
• Guy Delisle, Shenzhen: A Travelogue from China (8/15)
  
• Kazu Kibuishi, Flight, Volume Five (8/17)
  
• Elmore Leonard's 10 Rules of Writing (8/17)
  
• Seiichi Hayashi, Red Colored Elegy (8/17)
  
• Mia Ikumi, Koi Cupid, Vol. 1 (8/18)
  
• P.G. Wodehouse, Plum Pie (8/18)
  
• Shoko Hamadi, Flock of Angels, Vol. 1 (8/19)
  
• Haruki Murakami, What I Talk About When I Talk About Running (8/19)
  
• Nari Kusakawa, Two Flowers for the Dragon, Vol. 2 (8/20)
  
• Masashi Kishimoto, Naruto, Vol. 22 (8/21)
  See above; a second good ninja and a second evil ninja battle to what looks like their collapse and at least near-death. Meanwhile, the remnants of both sides are racing to the main villain, Orochimaru.
  
• Larry McMurtry, Books: A Memoir (8/21)
  
• Jodi Picoult, et. al., Wonder Woman: Love and Murder (8/22)
  
• Janet Chui & Jason Erik Lundberg, editors, A Field Guide to Surreal Botany (8/23)
  
• Mitchell Symons, The Other Book...of the Most Perfectly Useless Information (8/24)
  This was the book I read bits of at bedtime over the summer, and it's not worth having its own entry. It's the third in a series of entertaining but obviously shallow books of random facts (This Book... was part of my Book-A-Day pace last year). I know enough random information to catch Symons out now and then on a fact he got wrong, which makes me worry about the truth of the surrounding material. But these books are pleasant and probably mostly accurate, so I'm happy enough with them.
  
• Scott McCloud, Zot! 1987-1991: The Complete Black and White Collection (8/26)
  
• Kaoru Ohashi, Nightmares for Sale, Vol. 1 (8/26)
  
• Negi Banno, S.S. Astro: Asashio Sogo Teachers Room, Vol. 1 (8/28)
• Chaco Abeno, Naoki Hisaya, & Naru Nanao, Sola, Vol. 1 (8/28)
• Michael Bell, editor, Scouts in Bondage and Other Violations of Literary Propriety (8/29)
• Neil Gaiman & Gris Grimly, The Dangerous Alphabet (8/29)
• Stephan Pastis, Pearls Before Swine: The Crass Menagerie (8/30)
  

And that's what I read this last month. Coming in September: probably more of the same...